Protestors clash with police outside Polish Constitutional Tribunal as court’s head removed in ‘coup d’état’

Poland’s right-wing president turned his plane around late Friday evening and canceled a planned trip to Senegal as allies say a “coup d’etat” is being carried out under left-wing Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

President Karol Nawrocki wrote on Friday, “At such a moment, the President must be in Poland. I'm interrupting my flight to Senegal. I'm returning.” Per Polskie Radio, Nawrocki had been heading to Senegal with a delegation and was set to meet with the country’s president and representatives of the African Union. Nawrocki is aligned with the right-wing Law and Justice party (PiS).

On Friday, the Metropolitan Police Headquarters announced that its officers are “carrying out statutory activities at the premises of the Constitutional Tribunal in Warsaw.” The Constitutional Tribunal is the highest court in Poland.

Barriers have been placed in the area and authorities have removed security from the premises in an attempt to restore “public order,” per the Washington Examiner.

Liberal Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said that the police action was necessary for “restoring the rule of law.”

He wrote, “Restoring the rule of law is our duty. After years of PiS-led lawlessness, this is a difficult process, sometimes painful, and it requires decisive action. There is no other way.”

Inside the court, court president Bogdan Święczkowski was reportedly removed and in his place, Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska was appointed interim president. The change had been reflected on the court’s website. Korwin-Piotrowska is one of multiple judges that Nawrocki has refused to swear in to the PiS-aligned Constitutional Tribunal since March on the grounds that their selection procedure was flawed. The judges had been elected by Poland’s parliament.

The Constitutional Tribunal’s social media account, however, said that Święczkowski remains president. “An unlawful takeover of the Constitutional Tribunal's website has occurred. The President of [the Constitutional Tribunal] remains Bogdan Święczkowski, and the Vice-President is Bartłomiej Sochański. Ms. Anna Korwin-Piotrowska is not a judge of the Constitutional Tribunal. All persons participating in these actions are committing the crime of a coup d’état.”

At the center of the dispute is the appointment of Maciej Berek to the court, who was elected by the left-controlled lower chamber of parliament. Per the Brussels Signal, Tusk has described Berek as his “right-hand man,” and opponents have argued that Berek, who had served as a minister in Tusk’s government until August, should not sit on the tribunal.

Berek must swear an oath of office in front of Nawrocki, but the president has blocked attempts to make that happen. He instead swore his oath before parliament.

Outside the court on Friday night, protestors gathered, clashing with police. Some were seen attempting to cut a chain that had been placed on the court’s fence.

Former Polish President Andrzej Duda spoke out against the actions, writing, “P. Tusk and his people, who are saddling us with debt and are pathetically inept economically, have today also proven themselves to be thuggish rabble who carried out a brutal assault on a constitutional organ of the state. They don't know how to win in accordance with the law, on democratic principles, so they resort to the truncheon. That's how ‘European’ they are.”